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Tuesday, 18 November 2014

Babli too has a right to toilets

"Namaste

Myself Babli. I am 12 years old. I live in Chember. Chember is a small village in your big India. You cannot locate it on map. My Maa tells me that there are many small villages in big India. Hazaaro! Arey 5 are near my Chember only, Sacchi.

I live very interesting life. I wake. I bath. I do pooja. I jhadoo. Then I go to school also. In the evening I am free. So mother makes me go to the nearby big village to get water for next day. I love to go to nearby village. Ask why? Because there I can do susu without fear. Hehe!

Nearby village has big homes, big schools, big wells, big water pumps and toilets also. You must be thinking why I need toilets. Actually there are no toilets in my village. I do susu and potty in open only. Each morning I walk 1 km and reach the place to my toilet. You know, like dogs have their own places to pee and they divide territories that way, same to same with our village. We have our own places to pee. Our village people no less than dogs.

Yesterday my brother was so tired to walk that he dirtied his pants. Mother scold him a lot. But what to do, he is still small. He does not understand why we have to walk so much when we have urgent pressure. I laughed at him. We have to walk because we are poor. Poor do toilet only in Jungles. That is why my teacher tells me "Do not cut trees." Where will the poor hide while doing susu if we cut trees.

Also, poor cannot use closed toilets for peeing. Only rich people in nearby big village and big cities can do it. I told my brother all this. But he won't understand. Anyway he is a boy, it is easy for him to pee anywhere. We girls, very difficult. Specially for my mother, she wears sari no. We have to be careful all the time. I feel like I am doing some paap . Wanting to go to toilet is no bad habit! or is it for the poor? I do not know.

My teacher also tells me keep your surroundings clean. I am a bad girl because I fail to do that. My whole village is bad village. God will punish us I think. But I ask God, if I want to keep my surroundings clean, does that mean I should never want to go to toilet? One time I tried that. Did not work. I had to run down the street to my regular place so fast! Haha. Puja was laughing at me when she saw me. Not only Puja, other people also laugh at me. One day when I was going sitting down behind a tree on the side of the road, a car went. 2 children from the car looked at me from window and laughed. They pointed fingers at me and showed everyone in the car. I cried so much that day. But now it's a habit.

And so I never miss a chnace to go to nearby big village. Maybe when I grow up I will live in places which have toilets, if God blesses me! "

Photo by The Hindu

The world is slowly acknowledging the need to talk about toilets, but we need to do more. In 2010, the United Nations General Assembly and Human Rights Council recognized a human right to safe drinking water and sanitation. Through the Millennium Development Goals (MDG), the global community committed to a series of targets designed to address development challenges, including a 2015 goal of reducing by half the number of people without access to sanitation. However, the targets for sanitation are dismally behind. With the MDG targets set to expire soon, sanitation — and its role as a women’s issue — must be given high priority in forthcoming Sustainable Development Goals. India has launched several large government programs to expand access to sanitation, but success has been elusive.

The solution to this problem cannot wait, given the disproportionate impact that lack of access to sanitation has on women around the world. If the promise of a human right to sanitation is to have any meaning, then the idea of human dignity that is at the core of human rights must apply to all people and transcend all aspects of daily life, even the parts that are taboo.

But, you can bring about the change in the lives of millions of kids, thereby showing your support for the Domex Initiative. All you need to do is “click” on the “Contribute Tab” on www.domex.in and Domex will contribute Rs.5 on your behalf to eradicate open defecation, thereby helping kids like Babli live a dignified life.